


we must die an everlasting death

by asexualizing (Specialcookies)



Category: Ocean's 8 (2018)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, But they're all dead, Drug Use, F/F, Grief/Mourning, Inspired by Dead Like Me, a relatively happy ending, every single character except Tammy and Claude is dead, more like...based on the concept because I've never actually seen the show
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-08
Updated: 2020-04-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:14:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21718255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Specialcookies/pseuds/asexualizing
Summary: It is impossible to have died and still be alive, isn't it? And she is alive. She is standing in a Brooklyn Brownstone wearing her favorite dress and there is sunlight, and scents, noises, and she can feel things, touch. How is that dying?Prison was dying. But this…this can't possibly be Death.Nothing makes sense. None of it. Why does she need to do this? If she's dead, let her be fucking deadDebbie dies in prison. But that's only the beginning of the story.
Relationships: Lou Miller/Debbie Ocean
Comments: 21
Kudos: 30





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was a request by Journadin on tumblr. Thank you for this prompt, it is a challenge and a joy to write <3 I really hope you like the way it's coming out. Kind of played loosely with the shows' rules.
> 
> title is a quote from Marlowe's Doctor Faustus.

The human body, when in pain, reaches a point where nerves become indiscernible. The soles of your feet might as well be your shoulder blades and your guts might as well be the top of your head. You could say "it hurts all over" or that your body is burning, but Debbie thinks of it as white noise; thinks of her body as a radio waves transmission tool that cannot find the right wavelength. Later, the white noise becomes so strong that the pain doesn't matter at all—it might as well be the body's normal state of being. But before that, the white noise is an inescapable, constant stream.

They say the human mind can handle everything we believe that we can't take, that that's humans' most valuable survival tool. At least, that's how Debbie thinks of her own mind, its will to always move forward. She is stuck amongst a group of women who are beating her and each other senseless but Debbie knows better than to believe that this is how it ends. It's white noise. She closes her eyes and forces her mind to _work_ : she can slip out if she can just remember the layout of the dining hall. To her left there's the door to the kitchen; if she can make it outside of this mess without being caught by a cop enjoying the excuse to abuse prisoners. She is faintly aware of the stab wound in her stomach, but it doesn't matter more than anything else does. First thing's first. She needs to get out.

She breathes, reaches, pushes, twists, grunts, and voila—

"Hey, hey," a woman catches her as she stumbles out of the fight and towards the kitchen door.

"Move," Debbie tells her, tries to push through her as well. The space around her blurs, but she insists. When she glances down there is no blood anymore, and the woman doesn't move. She is short, Asian, wears a beanie and nothing orange; Debbie doesn't recognize her face and Debbie has learned to recognize even the most obscured and short-lived faces in this place—that's power. "Move," she repeats. It appears as if she's starting to hallucinate, and she needs to get to the doctor, the one she bribes with contraband. She pushes with more confidence.

"Stop," the woman says, and then, snapping her fingers, she makes everything stop.

*

The room she awakes in is bright and calm, nothing like prison. It is clean. _She_ is clean. Her eyes have not yet gotten used to the strong daylight coming through the large windows, and so she blinks as she looks around her. And then there is the woman, who snaps her fingers at Debbie to grab her attention. What the fuck?

"Yo," the woman calls. "Can you look at me?"

Debbie does. "Where am I?" she asks. Has Danny decided his little sister needs to be free after hearing she almost got killed in a prison fight? Has she been unconscious for…how long now? What day is it? It is certainly morning, that's the least she can tell. Is she in one of her family's secret homes with secret infirmaries where she will have to face her parents? She will _kill_ Danny if he's forcing her to see their parents, she absolutely rather still be in prison. She looks around, registering a Brownstone's exposed brick walls and the strange cluster of a New York apartment. Okay, back to her city, that's a start.

"Yo," the woman snaps her fingers once more, and Debbie turns back to her. She's a bit irritated by now, what with being broken out of prison while unconscious somehow and finding herself in a strange apartment with this strange person (who is still wearing the same Dod damn Beanie) who is taking forever to tell her what's going on. She had plans for being out, but she also relied on not being a runaway to execute them. She needs to start reworking those. The Met Gala would be much harder to attend if she's on a wanted list. God Fucking Damnit Daniel Ocean. Couldn't let her handle her own shit, couldn't he? The woman in front of her seems unimpressed with Debbie's scornful gaze. Is she new to Danny's team? They used to all be terrified by Debbie. How is she supposed to make an impression all bandaged up?

Right. She is not bandaged up. Another strange thing. She was sure with what her body suffered she'd have to stay bedbound for at least a few weeks, one week if she'd have gotten impatient, which she would have, but now—

"Oh my god, do you ever stop thinking?" The woman groans in frustration.

Debbie looks down at herself. Good as new. Her clothes…Is that her favorite dress? Did she wake up on a couch wearing her favorite dress? In this fucking Brownstone?

Getting up, she walks over to the woman who has by now thrown her hands up in the air and started pacing around the room instead of trying to force Debbie to pay attention to her.

"What the fuck?" Debbie asks. The woman stops, looks Debbie in the eyes, and sighs.

"Finally. Okay. Good morning, Deborah Marie Ocean. My name is Constance, and any more names than that would be excessive, in my opinion. Not a dig at you, it's always part of my speech. Anyway. You're dead. Welcome to the afterlife. Or, rather, welcome to this very specific type of afterlife. You have been chosen to—"

"What?"

"Let me finish. You have been chosen to—"

"I'm not dead. You can stop. I don't know what the fuck Danny is playing at but I am _clearly_ not dead."

"Are you, now?"

"How stupid do you think I am?"

Constance— _Constance?_ —examines her for a few moments, which seem to take forever. Debbie crosses her arms, rolls her eyes as Constance— _Constance??—_ doesn't say a word, instead tilts her head and runs her fingers over her chin as if she has a beard.

"Look can you just—" Debbie begins in deep exasperation, but that is exactly when Constance— _Constance.—_ decides to speak.

"I would say you're not _stupid_ , per se, but you are definitely _dumb_ on some levels, at least that's the vibe I'm getting…"

"Excuse me?"

"I mean—" Debbie's glare seems to have finally gotten through to Constance. Now she can get the information she needs and move on to recalibrate.

When she's sure Constance is not gonna break the silence by saying another conspicuously stupid thing, and that Constance's eyes are where she wants them to be (glued to hers in a way that means Constance is worried about what Debbie might do to if she looked away), Debbie speaks calmly and evenly: "Just tell me where is Danny."

Constance furrows her brows. "Who's Danny? Listen. Deborah. Debbie? You look like you go by Debbie. I've always been very good at _catching_ the souls, not so good at breaking the news to them. But you are dead. You died violently in a prison fight. I mean—I can’t sugarcoat it, you died violently. You got beaten up and stabbed. Say thank you to the afterlife for, well—" at this, Constance waves vaguely at Debbie's body, which besides being perfectly intact, is also good-looking, which Constance makes sure Debbie understands by whistling.

"Died," Debbie repeats, deadpanned and deeply skeptical, but Constance claps her palms and rejoices.

"Yes. Died. Now we're getting it."

Debbie cannot tell if Constance is lying. She usually can, almost always can, she has an acute lie detector, but not here. Not now, not with this woman. The simple fact of her capabilities being off bugs her more than it should, considering the news she just got, but she _feels_ off when lies and truths are not easily discernible, always have been uneasy when uncertain. She should possibly care about Constance's actual words more than she does about her lie detector, but she cannot focus like that—she needs her balance, needs clear lines and boundaries. It is impossible to have died and still be alive, isn't it? And she is alive. She is standing in a Brooklyn Brownstone wearing her favorite dress and there is sunlight, and scents, noises, and she can _feel_ things, touch. How is that dying? She feels alive for the first time in years, before prison, ever since she left—

Lying on the concrete prison floor was dying. Prison was dying. But this…this can't possibly be Death.

Light flickers. Catches Debbie's eyes. On Constance's wrist, illuminated by a ray of sunshine, Danny's watch rests.

Without thinking, Debbie launched forward and grabs Constance's arm, twists it and takes the watch off before Constance can even respond.

"What the—" Constance pulls away. Debbie lets her, she has what she needs.

"Why do you have Danny's watch?" she asks again, more confident, short fuse blown to hell already.

" _Who_ is Danny? Fuck. What's with the violence? You seemed like the nice one in that prison."

"The watch. Why do you have it?"

"Because I thought I'd get something nice out of your personal belongings. That's how I work. Didn't think it'd be so important."

Debbie arches a sharp eyebrow at Constance. When all else fails, that always gets the truth out of people. But Constance says nothing. She sighs, then falls on a leather loveseat near her dramatically.

Debbie wraps the watch's strap around her wrist, tightens in, rolls her joint and examines the way the light reflects off the silver on it, examines its weight and the warm touch to her skin, the usual contrast between her slimness and the size of the watch.

"You steal personal belongings of people who are in prison?" she asks Constance, her mind working hard to stay in the moment as the ticking hands on the watch move seconds and minutes forward.

"I steal shit from people who are dead."

"You make no sense." Looking up at Constance, Debbie's heart thumps at the grave expression on the previously juvenile face. "What?" she asks when it becomes clear that Constance is struggling with her words.

"Just—It's never easy but…I can show you your body."

Her body. Her body is right _here_. Where else would it fucking be? Debbie pinches the bridge of her nose, shuts her eyes tightly and tries to foresee the different possibilities of how this could go—maybe Constance is going to murder her. Who the fuck knows anymore. She pinches harder, feels the slight ache in the bones of her nose. Her body…this is her body.

She needs this to stop. She is out of prison, and she has plans.

"Okay," she tells Constance. "Show me whatever you want, and then let me go."

"What?"

"I'll come with you, you'll show me my…my body, and then I go wherever the fuck I want."

"That's—you know what?" Constance jumps up, walks over to Debbie and pets Debbie's shoulder twice. "Fine."

And Constance snaps her fingers again.

***

The room is cold. Colder than her coldest night in prison. Constance hums and searches around the different silver cubicles where many dead people lie while Debbie breathes in the smell of sanitizers and disinfectants, focuses on the goosebumps forming on her skin and how she shudders slightly, twitches her fingers and feels her joints moving. This is her body. Whatever Constance is going to show her—this is her body. And then she will be out of here. And then she can do whatever she wants.

Then she hears Constance pulling a bed out, turns around.

"Here," Constance says. Debbie steps closer as Constance steps back. She looks down. She swallows, closes her eyes. Reaches out to touch and changes her mind. Blinks involuntarily, breathes. Looks and looks and looks.

"Fuck you," she then spits, turns around in a flourish and leaves the room. She can hear Constance calling to her, can hear Constance chasing her, but Debbie walks resolutely; heels tap-tap-tapping in a fast rhythm, passing by people who don't even manage to look up at her and wonder. Before long she is outside, in the sun. Her body is outside, in the sun.

She heaves, leans forward, afraid to shut her eyes. That is how she usually forces herself to focus, but she can't—she can't see _that_ again, her body—

"Debbie!" Constance catches up to her, then, and Debbie yanks away from the hand on her shoulder so violently that she might as well still be in that prison fight.

Her body, lying pale and still, cut open and sewn shut like there is nothing left in it to protect. A line down her middle, just the path Lou's fingers used to take, except there's nothing gentle about that line, nothing gentle about any of the lines, just clear, brutal cuts where warmth once was. Her guts twist like someone is pulling them out of her body. She remembers Lou telling her what holding a scalpel felt like before she gave up on the idea of being a doctor. _It's a tool, you know? But you open people up with it. A knife, there's life in. It's messy. But with a scalpel, it's all precision and pedantry. I know it saves lives, but it's chilling just to think of._

"Fuck you," Debbie yells at Constance once more. What else is she supposed to say? The traffic is loud, people pass by their left and their right, probably ignoring them as they would any other New York middle-of-the-street hassle. "That's not my body."

"Look, I know it's not easy, and I'm crap at this, but you gotta start accepting that—"

Debbie breathes in, sharp. Raises her finger to shut Constance up. She doesn't need to accept anything. She's had enough. She's had enough of this whole thing. She's going to find Lou, Lou's going to find them a crew, and she's going to show Danny who's the real Ocean here. Whatever this is, it ends, now. She needs Lou. She just needs Lou, and this would all go away.

"I let you take me here, now you let me go. Play your games on your own. I'm done trying to understand what's going on."

Constance softens, again, just like before she took Debbie here, and Debbie has half a mind to physically block her ears from hearing what more Constance has to say.

But she doesn't. She doesn't, because something clicks into place, and something inside Debbie does not feel off anymore—a precision cut—she knows what she sees, she recognizes it still. It's truth. Constance speaks truth.

Her hand stays afloat mid-air, Debbie unsure if she should give it up and let it fall or keep shutting Constance up.

"You're dead," Constance repeats, for who knows what time. "I'll let you go, but honestly, there's nowhere else to go right now."

She wants to curse more, wants to fight it, but her throat closes up. She never could fully explain how she knows to read people. She just does. She's an Ocean. Some things, they're in her blood. She went against her instincts once, and she knew even then that she should never do it again.

"You're dead, Debbie, but there's work left to do," Constance pleads, almost, it sounds like. So uncharacteristic, but then again, Debbie never truly knew her. She's dead, too, isn't she? "You're dead."

For the first time since this started, Debbie cannot deny that she just might be.

"Where are you going?" Constance calls after her, but Debbie ignores her. "Wait, fuck, you can't actually—" she hears, but she continues walking, not even looking back to see Constance following her.

***

She checks every corner in the city Lou might be at. Nothing. She calls the number she will never forget through a payphone. Nothing.

"This is futile," Constance complains, grumpily sticking to Debbie's side in whichever step Debbie takes.

"I need to find someone."

"You can't—"

"I don't care."

"Fuck."

They round a corner approaching the last place Debbie knows Lou's owned, but even before they investigate inside, Debbie knows it's going to be nothing.

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

She doesn't even know anybody in New York anymore. That's what she needs Lou for. How is she supposed to find Lou if she needs Lou for that?

"Slow down!" Constance calls at her. She is now following Debbie on a skateboard.

New Yorkers never spare you a glance, do they? You can murder someone in the middle of the fucking street.

Nothing—everywhere, one big nothing.

When Debbie abruptly stops and turns around for the first time in hours now to face Constance, Constance almost falls off her skateboard.

"What the fuck!" she calls, but Debbie stands unaffected with her hands crossed across her chest.

"Do you have my phone?"

"What?"

"My phone, that other thing which was in my personal belongings?"

"Oh. Uh. Yeah."

Of course. Why not.

***

"Who are you calling?" Constance keeps asking, and Debbie keeps ignoring her. The phone rings and rings, but Tammy doesn't answer. It seems unusual for her. She's always picked up Debbie's number in a heartbeat.

"None of your business," Debbie finally snaps.

"Look, I need to tell you something about—"

"You've told me enough."

"Not really, not really at all."

"I don't care."

"Jesus, hang up, please. This isn't going to—"

 _Finally_.

"Is this a fucking joke?" Tammy's voice rings sharp through the line. She's always known how to warmly welcome Debbie back. Why should post-death phone calls be any different?

"Hey, there, Tim-Tam."

"It better be Danny."

"It's me."

"Rusty?"

"No…It's me, Deb. Debbie. Deborah."

There's a long, extremely uncomfortable and heavy silence on the other side of the line before Tammy inhales sharply, and speaks in her low, cruel, angry tone: "I'm going to hang up now. Whoever the fuck this is, go to fucking hell."

"Tam, it's _me._ "

"Shut up!"

"Look it's—"

"No, you know what? Whatever lame scam you're trying to run through a dead person's number wouldn't have worked anyway, but I am tired, I have two kids, a dumb husband, and a best friend whom I've _just_ had to go to the morgue to recognize, so fuck the fuck off and never fucking call this number again. Jesus."

Debbie doesn't even have time to breathe through the assault before Tammy simply hangs up. She stands there, dumbfounded, trying to catch up with what just happened. Tammy would have recognized her voice anywhere, from any distance or any number of years without hearing it. It's _Tammy._ They've known each other so long now it doesn't matter what realm Debbie's in, Tammy should _know_ her.

Constance sighs beside her. "You probably sound like a gruff, Irish man or something."

"What?" Debbie asks, clipped, slides her phone into the pocket in her dress.

"Look, come on. Let's go back."

"Where?"

"Home."

"I—"

"Come on."

Home. What home? Debbie follows, numb. Dead.

***

"So you collect souls?"

Constance nods, chewing, for some unfathomable reason, on a huge subway. They're back in the Brownstone, after taking a quick detour to get Constance's food. She's been patient enough with Debbie's rage outbursts and attempts to act like a normal human being that Debbie figures she deserves her attention, just a for a little bit. It's hard to breathe, but she puts on the mask she knows so well and pushes through the tightness in her chest because if Constance sees her cry, that would be a new low.

"And you need to collect enough of those to move…passed this."

"Mhmm."

"But you don't know how many that is."

"Yeah, we're like, collecting as a group. There was a dude before you, you were his last soul. Bless him, I guess."

"And you squat in fancy places."

"Pretty dope."

"And when you decide to appear to people, which you can do when you talk to them, they don't see _you_. They don't hear _you. You_ don't exist to them anymore. They see…"

"Some random ass bitch."

"Yeah, some random ass bitch," Debbie deadpans slowly.

Nothing makes sense. None of it. Why does she need to do this? If she's dead, let her be fucking dead. Tammy's panicked voice rings in her ears, and all she can think about is the way Lou would have reacted if she'd found her, and stood there in front of her, looking like some random ass bitch. Does she even know Debbie's dead? If they called Tammy from the morgue, that means Lou really did change her number, and that Danny's ass is ninety-nine percent in that grave they told her he's in since she believes—she wants to believe—he would come back to mourn his dead sister. Like she had to mourn him for months in prison, hiding tears, hiding everything, no weakness. What good did it do her? She could have just fucking curled into a ball because her big brother was gone and she felt alone, so alone, as alone as she feels now, thinking about the look on Lou's face if a stranger ever claimed to be Debbie Ocean.

"So what?" she asks, trying to distract herself from the bitter taste in her mouth with more information. "I collect souls now?"

"Yes."

"And squat in houses."

"Yes."

"So how do I know who's soul I need to collect?"

"Well, we get messages. In, uh, shadows."

"You get messages in shadows?"

"Yes."

"This is ridiculous."

"I know."

Debbie taps her fingers on the table, closes her eyes and wants the feeling of wood-on-skin to stop. "Better get me to collect all my souls as soon as possible," she murmurs, "because I never do anything half-way through. If I'm dead, I want to be _fucking dead_."

Constance swallows a big bite loudly. "Sure."

Debbie bits her lip until she feels nothing but pain.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The dead are not meant to remember.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I wanted to post this in three chapters, but chapter 2 felt like it should be split into two parts, so I'm posting this part today and the next one next week. Then the final chapter whenever that would be ready! Enjoy.

Apparently, squatting in fancy houses isn't as charming as Constance has made it seem. There's enough available real estate in New York City to house all its poor and homeless, but somehow, Constance _has_ to choose the places they will get in trouble for being in at some point. It's just "funner", as she says, by which she means she wants a newly renovated apartment with a giant TV screen and "dope" food in the fridge, even if they need to relocate constantly and hurriedly, which for Constance is all part of the fun. Debbie just wants a place to stay, just wants the world to stop spinning—isn't that what it's supposed to fucking do when you're dead? Isn't that the only benefit? She never believed in an afterlife, she thought if she were to be dead, that would mean everything finally ended. This is more awful than she could have ever imagined.

"Can we just choose one of those empty lofts that nobody pays attention to?" She speeds up her steps to catch up with Constance, whose short legs seem to be more efficient that one would think.

They are on their way to a new place. No messages in no shadows just yet. Debbie doesn't understand how it all works, exactly, just yet, but her eyes keep drifting sideways everywhere they go, searching. She wants to _do_ something—this nothing, this constant moving towards nothing, is starting to get on her nerves. In places they stay at, she paces, driving Constance crazy with the tap-tapping of her heels; drums her fingers on surfaces, sketches plans she never got to execute in her past life and will never get to execute in her afterlife; tries to wait, relax, anything but fall into the habit of her nervous ticks that Lou used to calm, because Lou isn't here to calm her, and she can't allow herself to think of Lou. The dead are not meant to mourn the living.

Constance doesn't slow down—she looks around corners as if they were crosswalks, dangerous and demanding her attention lest she'll lose something to them. Does she know something that Debbie does not? Is she waiting for a message?

"Constance," Debbie tries to demand her attention when Constance neglects to answer.

"What?" Constance replies, distracted.

Debbie lays a hand on her shoulder, makes her stop. The street is oblivious as ever. "What's going on?"

Constance turns to look at her. "Nothing," she insists. Debbie does not yet know how to read Constance—she recognizes her as one of their own, a thief, a con, one whom Debbie's not _meant_ to be able to read as easily as she does most people, but it doesn't help the uneasiness that comes with not being able to decipher whatever the hell is always happening around her. She can tell Constance's lying, but she can't tell why, and she can't tell what's about. Constance crosses her arms, feigning impatience. "What were you saying?"

Debbie's unwilling to drop the subject. "Are you trying to fool me?"

"What about?"

"You keep looking over your shoulder as if the angel of death is coming any second now."

"Well, no, he usually knocks."

"Funny."

"I'm serious."

Deb, as she often does in these weird trying times with Constance, tries to stare her down. It's the only method she's found actually works in making Constance be honest. Constance doesn't crack. Debbie will have to ask her to explain how knocking exactly works, here, in this…not-life. As of now, she has something more urgent to figure out—

"Then what are you scared of?"

"Nothin'. Pick a loft, where do you want to live?"

"Constance."

"Ugh. Fine," Constance throws her arms up, turns her back to Debbie, and begins walking again. But she is speaking to Debbie as she surges ahead, and Debbie scrambles to catch up once again. She has never felt so old and so young at the same time before. "I maybe didn't tell you about the other two cogs in this murder machine."

"The other—" Debbie began, then stops herself from questioning Constance's language. She's yet to get used to it, but she has an infinity to do so; it doesn't matter. "There are two more people in our—this soul collecting group?"

"Yup."

"And why haven't I met them?"

"Nine is very adamant about being left alone when we don't have a job."

_A job._ God, but she loves hearing these words even here, even now. A special kind of excitement accompanies them, a kind of thrill, or the possibility of one, that Debbie could never resist. The kind of thrill that killed her. The kind of thrill that will, it seems, free her. It's easier to catch up to Constance now, with this purpose-driven phrase interwoven into her existence as a—what is it, a grim reaper? Is that what she is now? _A job._ They are walking side by side now, like partners, like she and Lou used to advance through streets, synced, flowing, understanding each other better than they ever did in any other aspect of their lives. She looks at Constance from the corner of her eye, trying to imagine what this would have been like if Lou were to pull her out of her body and into the afterlife. The dead are not meant to mourn the living.

"Nine?"

"Nine, Nine-Ball, Baller, just don't call her Leslie."

"Leslie."

"Do not."

"So, what's her deal?"

"Told you, she likes to be left alone if it isn't necessary for us to communicate."

"And what have you done?"

" _Why_ would you assume I did anything?"

"Because you're acting guilty."

"You sound like a cop."

"Don't insult me."

Constance gives her a half-smile, surprised to be impressed by Debbie, it seems; nothing like cop-hate to bring a couple of cons together. Constance has certainly acted like nothing but a con ever since they've met. Debbie can at least take comfort in that.

"What did you do?" She prompts Constance once again.

"I, uh, well we stayed in her house recently and I maybe smoked some her weed and, uh, she gets touchy about those things but look, she caught herself the sickest place in town and—"

"I'm going to stop you here," Debbie interjects, walking faster than Constance now, determined to _get somewhere already_. Now that she knows there's no danger, no interruption coming, no other twist to this bizarre plot, she can go back to figuring out how she's going to move on. Constance smoking some other grim reaper's weed is by far the least of her problems. "I do not care."

"You asked!"

"Yes, when I thought it was something serious."

"Oh, it is very serious."

"It's also your problem."

"That's how it's going to be from now on, is it? You pick someone up, let them into the afterlife, explain everything to them, and just like that, your problems are your own. No sympathy."

"Yup."

"You're a mean lady, Ocean."

Debbie cannot help the smile creeping up on her. Constance is high-spirited, having as much fun as Debbie in this conversation. There's competence in her. There's the same kind of devil in both of them. Maybe this partnership is not so bad. Maybe Nine, Baller, whatever, would be okay, too. Maybe this can work. She will make it work. They'll help her get out of here alright. "So I've been told."

"Where are we going?"

"A permanent place to live."

"Ha, live."

"Excuse my language. Who's the fourth, by the way?"

"Hm?"

"You said we're a group of four. You, Nine, me, and…?"

"Oh. Well, I'll introduce you, I suppose. She's a bit of a loner, too, but not as bad as Nine. I suppose you'll meet Nine eventually, but, you know. Won't hurt for it to be when she's contractually obligated to meet you."

"That bad?"

"I told you it's serious!"

Then, Constance takes a sharp left, pulling Debbie after her. Debbie shakes Constance's hand off her wrist, falls back into step with her.

"Where are we going?"

"Lou's place."

Constance snaps her fingers, and for a moment, everything turns dark.

***

Constance's particular method of transporting them quickly back and forth from places includes what Debbie can only describe as a manic tunnel vision—she's been here, exactly here, in the past, lacking sleep and logic and only knowing that at the end of where she's heading there's something important she needs to get. Constance isn't particularly consistent with walking vs. snapping her fingers, opting for one or the other based on what Debbie can only suppose is a whim. She's learned to always expect this and the headaches—why does she even _have_ a headache—has receded into a dull ache when it happens. This time the blur of the moment has overshadowed anything that Debbie might have been able to feel. She only knows how fast the change has been.

They land in a giant loft that Debbie is too disoriented to take in properly, the space overwhelming her more than Manhattan's overcrowded streets. She closes her eyes, and she knows, she knows, she knows Lou's not going to be a giant breaded dude no matter how hard she's trying to will it so. She knows, as she closes her eyes, and recognizes the persistent scent of grease, the faint remains of a sandalwood candle that burned not too long ago, the lingering aromas from a kitchen well-used. A home that's never been her home. She cannot open her eyes, resists the urge to look, _examine_ , if only to save herself from the final nail in the coffin; she'd recognize Lou's eclectic yet perfectly coherent taste for home décor anywhere. She knows enough, she doesn't want to see it.

"Constance!" she hears a voice call, and she can almost breathe again—why does she even _need_ to breathe—as its shape and sound is nothing like Lou's low, nonchalant drawl. "I've told you a _million times_ —"

"Yo! What the fuck are you doing here?"

"I'm not allowed to hang with Lou now?"

"Then why am _I_ not invited?"

"Maybe if you wouldn't hijack my place and smoke my weed."

"Come on."

Debbie desperately wants to get lost in this meaningless argument, in Constance and whom she supposes to be Nine's painfully familiar banter—she can recognize a crew from miles away, let alone standing by them listening fight it off like siblings. That's what never worked for her and Danny; they could only ever be one kind of brother and sister, conning together only served to show them that too much of the same blood runs in their veins. That's always where Lou came in—not a mitigating presence per se but always calming, always pulling Debbie up and away from where she didn't want to be, always grounding.

_Fuck_ , she thinks, and thinks, and thinks, and that's all she can think as she opens her eyes, unstable, takes Lou's place in. Tall and vast, it's filled with Lou's love for art, Lou's love for music, Lou's love for the dramatics. Lou's beloved motorcycle stands by a wall, her records (their records?) and sound system proudly take over the center of the place. She scans the gallery, the poker table that Rusty bought them for an anniversary, the furniture that she can almost tell what street corner Lou got them from.

She shuts her eyes again against the torrent of Constance and Nine's conversation and the clicking high heels of Lou descending down the stairs to see what's the fuss is all about. She thinks she might fall deeper into the afterlife the longer she stands this way, the world around her might disappear altogether or swallow her in, the hollow in her chest that once was beating might grow bigger than its container.

Finally, she brings herself to look at Lou, now before her, standing as she does with her fingers tucked into the pockets of her leather pants. They stare, until Lou's body shifts, and her voice wraps Debbie up in its awful realness. The dead were never meant to feel alive.

"Hello, jailbird."

"Hey, stranger."

It takes no more than three seconds for Constance and Nine to turn to them. Lou does not look away from Debbie, a faint expression of harrowing avowal on her face. Debbie cannot break through the numbness, the chilling detachment she has so naturally and comfortably fallen into. Nine stares at her quizzically, while Constance breaks the silence to indignantly ask "you _know_ each other?"

"From a different lifetime," Lou answers, then tilts her head suggestively towards the back of the loft, inviting Debbie to get away from Constance and Nine.

"That's wild," Constance whistles.

"I don't want to be here for that sort of shit," Nine groans.

"Come on," Debbie manages to say before bypassing Lou on her way to a back door, staunchly ignoring Constance and Nine. Her back ruler-straight, her legs taking even, quick steps, she hears Lou falling into pace behind her, as if Debbie never left.

***

"And they say 'til death do us part," Lou tries a joke out.

"They vow to it," Debbie corrects, but it all falls flat, the attempt at lightness onerous to try and carry in a conversation.

"Slow down," Lou grabs her elbow as Debbie reaches a patch of beachy sand, standing dirty in Lou's backyard, and Debbie stumbles clumsily as she tries to jerk away from the touch, her body panicking and acting on its own. "Debbie," Lou tries again, this time with a hand on Debbie's shoulder.

She turns to face Lou, looks slightly up into her eyes to see them full of a tenderness that burns her insides. They stand close and share in their confined space a funeral-like silence. From Debbie's shoulder, Lou slides her palm up to her cheek, strokes a line and breathes in sharply.

"When?" Debbie asks, blunter than she thought she was capable of being right now.

"Don't do this."

"Lou, when?"

Lou sighs. Swallows. "Sometime after your sentence."

Debbie shakes her head, trying to process it all. Lou's hand falls down, lingering and lingering then gone all at once. "How?" Debbie pushes, wants to rip it off like a bandage, right now, when it's fresh, when the wound might still open and bleed.

Lou steps back, fingers back in her pockets. Debbie can see something shifting within her, knows her shields all too well. "Was it a prison fight?"

"How, Lou? What happened?"

"You were supposed to be out soon, weren't you?"

"Tell me."

"Don't do this, Deb."

"The motorcycle?"

"Don't do this."

The tension rises like the waves behind them, about to break against the shore. But an urgency pulls her forward and up with it, manic tunnel vision.

"A con?"

She follows Lou as Lou turns to look at the water, steps further away from Debbie's body.

"Debbie," she says like an orison.

"What was it?"

"Debbie," she says like a warning.

"Tell me."

"Don't."

"Don't _what?_ "

"Don't lament me!"

Lou turns back to her, hair blowing over her face in the strong wing. Debbie digs her fists into the pockets of her coat, clenches them so strong it hurts.

"You're dead, what am I supposed to do?" she wonders because something needs to make sense. Something needs to follow the logical steps it always does. A progression—grief has no logic, but this must have some.

"We're both dead. What's good is it, now? Coming back? Caring? What do you want, now?"

They let that sit between them. A ship's horn bellows in the distance. Debbie doesn't necessarily understand the turn of Lou's mood, the sudden outburst. "I didn't mean to come back," Debbie argues through gritted teeth. She knows she's pushed but Lou was gently stroking her face, just moments before. Legs sinking into sand, Debbie's not sure how to move from here. "What, then?" She waits for Lou, but Lou does not provide an answer. She turns away, against the wind, walks back inside with sure steps. Debbie watches her, images of the past flooding her body and mind as she lets the wind do as it may.

"Wish it wasn't you that came here," Lou calls to her over the shoulder. They've been walking away from each other for years now. The dead are not meant to remember.

***

"I've never seen her like this," Constance is telling Nine when Debbie steps back into the loft.

"That's why I don't get _involved_."

"But you like Lou."

Debbie stands in a safe distance, listens, unprepared to deal with anyone, let alone Constance and her abundance of questions. After a pause, Nine seems to surrender with a sigh.

"What do you think happened?"

"Lovers quarrel, obviously."

"That's what you always go with."

"Can you just go find her?"

"Sure, I'll be the only useful person in this crew."

As Nine leaves, Constance notices Debbie, rolls her eyes and walks over straight to the sound system and the records. Every fiber of Debbie's being is yelling at her to stop it like it could stop them from existing in this space where Lou was once breathing, heart beating in that incandescent way of it. It hurts to think about in ways she can't comprehend, but then again, nothing that has been happening is anything that she can comprehend. She wanted to leave this place immediately after her conversation with Lou, let Lou be if that's what she likes, but right now she does not think she can. She wants to understand.

"So," Constance begins, "how did you two, uh—"

"Lovers quarrel," Debbie nips the awkwardness in the bud. No use pretending.

Constance hides her satisfaction and slight embarrassment, but not well enough. Debbie watches her expertly thumbing through the racks of records, quick movements, vinyls falling almost indiscernible back and forth.

"That doesn't usually happen."

"What, death is not into poetics?"

"They're kinda dense, actually, uh, up, or down…there. They're kinda dense there."

With a sharp twist of her body, Debbie turns away from Constance and the records, walks over to the poker table. Chips are lying all around the green fabric, two decks of cards are leaning against each other. She runs her fingers over the dusty wood framing of the game area, resists the ghost-prints of their many nights around it, or no top of it. Swiftly, decidedly, she picks up one of the decks, walks over to Constance and throws it to her. Constance catches it effortlessly.

"Let's play a game," Debbie says. Constance moves far enough from the records for Debbie to stand by them, reads the room well enough to not argue. The disorganization falls beautifully into an order of release dates. She skims through decades compacted into these boxes while Constance shuffles, past the Frank Sinatras and the Elvis Presleys, the Elle Fitzgeralds and Bessi Smiths, the Motowns, right up to the 70s where she finds her favourite Tom Waits waiting quietly to be picked up.

"What kinda game?" Constance asks, lifts a disapproving eyebrow at Debbie touching Lou's— _their_ —records but doesn't stop her from putting The Heart of Saturday Night under the needle. She closes her eyes and sways slightly to the bluesy notes, Tom Waits' crackling deep voice.

"Fool me," she tells Constance. She's learned already that the girl is always up for a challenge. Constance doesn't ask any more questions.

She feels…light. The music brings the room around her back to life, and she can see Lou moving about within it, building something out of every situation, even the afterlife. If Constance does fool her, she decides, she'll go—leave Lou and the rest alone, let them do their work and deal with this afterlife by herself. If Constance doesn't, well, she stays, and there's nothing Lou could do to make her make the same mistake. She's been fooled once already.

Debbie turns to face Constance, ready to fight. She'll prove it.

_I never saw the white line 'til I was leaving you behind,_ Tom Waits sings as Debbie watches Constance's hands expertly working the deck of cards, but not expertly enough. And she never felt her heart strings until she nearly went insane.

The dead are not meant to fix the mistakes of the living, yet here they are.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What are the dead to do with each other?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, here it is, as promised, the second part of chapter 2, or as you may call it, chapter 3 out of 4. Enjoy!

She wonders, then, what was her funeral like. It's not something she enjoys thinking about; have been successfully avoiding it by focusing on the next steps towards a more…permanent? Definitive? She does now know how to describe the kind of death she is after. But now, with Lou's touch like a ghost on her post-mortem skin, Debbie wonders who buried her body and thought her gone with it.

With Danny gone—her whole family gone—she can assume one of Danny's crew took over the Kaddish. Rueben, possibly. Or was it Tammy, standing above a hole six-feet deep, letting a foreign language of a foreign religion roll off her tongue in a gesture of Catholic grace? And what's left of the Ocean blood now, anyway? With Lou here, in this everlasting death with her, Debbie cannot imagine a way she would have laid down in peace in her grave. Maybe that's the Ocean blood in her. Maybe that's what left.

Before she left Lou, she always imagined if she died Lou would say the Kaddish. She knew it was Danny who was supposed to say it, but she told Lou, once, that she wants her to be the one sending her off with a blessing. She remembers Danny saying it above their father's grave, remember not understanding why she's crying but knowing that some things are just more powerful than hate, and wanting Lou to be the one to communicate that kind of power to the people gathered around her grave, because who but Lou could ever understand Debbie better? Could ever know in their heart who they are saying goodbye to?

"Why do you think about death?" Lou asked her, and Debbie didn't know what to answer, so she said: "because it's going to happen one day, and I like being prepared."

She did not think, then, that she would ever find a reason to leave Lou. But when one searches for reasons, reasons come—ambition was always a good reason for her to do things, including stupid things, and Debbie chose a man who had nothing but luster and the offer of instant satisfaction over Lou and her incandescent heart. She never talked to Claude about dying. She thought, whatever happens, Lou would know what to say.

And here they are.

***

Nine's the one to walk through the door of the loft back in, Lou being nowhere in sight.

"Well," she declares. Constance has long now been busy doing her own thing pointedly away from Debbie after Debbie has revealed every single trick she's tried on her. Debbie tears her eyes away from a book detailing the history of Le Monocle and the lesbian community in Paris to look at Nine. The terror of being told to fuck off again by Lou is replaced by a mixed relief—she has hoped to see Lou returning, but Nine is surrounded by a positive aura that allows Debbie to hope. "Never signed up for that, but I guess shit happens." Debbie's not sure if she's talking to her or not, as Nine is distracted by picking up some personal items from around the loft, not paying attention to Debbie. Then she calls so loudly that Debbie is shocked to discover that any person can have it in them: "Constance! Lou said to fuck off!"

"Debbie too?" Constance calls back before Debbie can be the one to ask that. She's hopeful, but being unable to see Lou, she's also uncertain—she can read her best when they can talk in silence, messages and words have never been their strong suit, let alone ones carried out by other people. But Nine's reply, thought short and pointed, is a wave of sweetness in Debbie's ears.

"Nope! I'll let you stay with me, come on!"

"Whaaaaaat?" Constance's mood is certainly improved by Nine's suggestion, Debbie's too-clever-eyes forgotten now forgotten. It doesn't matter to her that much, but being already familiar with Constance's persistent sulks she knows it is preferable this way.

Nine winks at Debbie, her first true acknowledgment of Debbie's presence. Debbie's not sure how to react.

When Constance emerges from somewhere deep in the loft, she's quick to join Nine by the door, steps easy. They share a complicated handshake that Debbie can only assume means they do not actually hate being in each other's presence at all, not even a little bit. Exiting with a mock-salute, Nine and Constance leave Debbie alone with the echo of Lou. She lets it wrap comfortably around her until she thinks she might have fallen asleep if only she could. She does not care to know what the dead can possibly dream about. She goes back to reading.

***

She wonders, then, what are the dead to do with their legacy. What are the dead to do with each other?

***

"You've always been a deeply immersed reader."

Debbie did not notice Lou's return. Now, Lou's hovering by the door to her own home, observing Debbie in her space, a kind of space she knows Lou's always been protective off. Dead or alive, she knows, a place Lou cultivates is a part of her soul, and maybe, maybe she wants to let Debbie in, but maybe, as their conversation earlier has shown, she doesn't.

"It's a good book." She holds it up for Lou to see. Taking the bait, Lou steps closer to her, passing by the poker table, the record player, ending up kneeling by Debbie's legs. Debbie unabashedly stares.

"Ah, yes," she says, a faint smile on her face, adds nothing more than that, and lifts her eyes to meet Debbie's. "You're not as subtle as you used to be, though."

Debbie shuts the book with a thud, lays it beside her on the couch and refuses to surrender. Lou is close again, physically, impossibly close, and Debbie is slowly losing the ability to restrain herself. Her plan to understand might just go to hell if she wouldn't.

"We're talking again?"

"I'm trying it. Nine said—well, Nine said I don't have anywhere to run, so we might as well."

"Smart girl."

"You have no idea."

"I'm sorry, you do know that. For leaving."

"I thought I'd never get to hear you say that."

"But I am saying that."

"I'm not sure what it makes me feel."

"I'm sorry for leaving. I'm sorry for Claude. I'm sorry for being, well, an Ocean. I'm sorry for—"

"Dying?"

"I suppose."

"Me too."

With a silent understanding, a silent acknowledgment, Debbie takes the first step.

"A stab wound in the middle of a fight," she provides. Lou lets her take hold of her freezing hand. Debbie lays it against where the wound to the liver underneath her flesh killed her. "Here."

Lou clutches Debbie's shirt. Her eyes flutter shut. "I _was_ supposed to be released soon. I had—plans. For me. For us. I wanted to find you. I suppose…I suppose I did." Debbie feels the pull, that magnetism towards Lou's body that used to remind her that she is still alive on bad days. If Lou wouldn't have broken the silence, Debbie's sure she would have kissed her right then and there. But Lou smashes it into rubble. "I missed you," she says, a confession that feels more like an axiom than any surprise.

"Lou—"

"No, listen. I lost you."

"Lou—"

" _Listen,_ " she insists, and Debbie shuts her mouth, lets her do what she needs to. "I mourned you."

Lou clutches harder at Debbie's shirt, digging into Debbie's skin and flesh and whatever remained inside of her after death. Debbie reaches up, a palm to Lou's cheek, feels the unbearable softness of it, the unbearable firmness of the line of her jaw. The unbearable existence of it. When Lou speaks again, the strain is gone. The edges around her words soften.

"Constance picked me up from the floor of my bedroom here."

Debbie does not need an explanation. "When did you start using again?"

"Alcohol, first, when you left with Claude. Not sure about the heroine."

Debbie wishes she knew how to cry. "I'm sorry, baby," she lets the loving word slip, even though she's not sure they can handle it just yet. She understands, now, why Lou pushed her away when she asked—she didn't want to blame Debbie, but there isn't anything else to do when telling the story. "I—"

"Look, it was stupid. You got sent to jail and I was angry. I was lonely. And he got to have his life and I thought—well, I thought we didn’t get to have ours. It was stupid, but I suppose…"

Debbie slides her hand up to Lou's hair. "An overdose?"

"I don't know anymore. But I'm here."

"And they say 'til death do us part."

Debbie's sure she would have kissed her right then and there if she could be certain that Lou would let her. But before she can decide, Lou swiftly gets up, says, "Dinner?" and walks over to the kitchen.

"Yeah," Debbie says, voice trembling in a way that Lou surely can notice.

***

It's strange how natural the scene feels. Lou's set up the table with two plates of Chinese takeaway that Debbie imagines was ordered by a big bearded dude. That's what Lou's alter-self must be. The sandalwood candles have been lit. Lou's sitting in her night-gown, and Debbie has opted for one of the cotton pajamas of hers that Lou has kept in a room on upstairs, for some reason. She's scared to ask. They are eating, the food tasting like Before—before all of this, before they both died. Debbie's starting to understand why Constance is constantly eating.

"So, you planned on finding me?" Lou casually asks as she chews on her dish. If Debbie would like to, she could imagine that this is a conversation they are having after her release from jail, before she reveals her plan. She's tempted to, but then, there's a hollow in her chest that like a beating heart keeps reminding her that whatever she imagines it cannot be real.

"I planned on many things."

"Like what?" Debbie smiles her secret-hiding smile and takes a bite. "Oh, come on," Lou laughs. "You don't need to play this game with me now."

After swallowing intentionally slowly, Debbie grants her an answer. "Well, I wanted to rob the Met."

"A museum?" Lou lifts a skeptical eyebrow.

Debbie shakes her head. "Someone _in_ the museum."

"Continue."

"Met Gala. 7 people. Jewels."

"What kind of jewels?"

"Big, blingy, big old Liz Taylor jewels that were—well, are, I suppose—locked in a safe fifteen feet underground."

And just like that, they are back in their old Brooklyn apartment, wearing sweatpants, drinking cheap wine, talking about conning people off their money as if they could get away with anything in the world.

Debbie tells Lou about the whole of it—the fakes, the hacking, the clothes, Claude Becker.

"It would have put him in jail for a very long time."

"Like he did you."

"Mhmm."

"And you'd have risked going back there."

"Well."

"You're unbelievable," Lou admonishes, but it's light and loving and she's looking at Debbie with a sort of relief on her face. She's here, not in jail. They're both dead, but Debbie's not in jail. Maybe she understands. Maybe she can forgive. Maybe some forces are stronger than Debbie's choice to make that mistake with Claude.

When they are done, Debbie picks up their plates in a gesture of goodwill and goes to work at the sink. Hot water running, soap covering her hands, she closes her eyes and lets herself imagine for a moment. It would have been successful, they would have been rich. That's the life they were supposed to have. But this might be okay, too.

"I got so angry when you asked me, on the beach," Lou says behind her. Debbie wants her beating heart back, but she can do with just Lou, too. She closes the tap, drying her hands with a towel as Lou wraps arms around her waist and presses her body against Debbie's. It's almost too much, but mostly, it isn't enough at all.

"You blamed me."

"No, don't be an idiot."

"I understand."

"I didn't blame you. I was ashamed."

"Of what?"

"Of giving up."

"On life?"

"On you."

"Lou."

"Debbie."

"Tell me the truth."

"I'm not sure if I killed myself or not."

"I love you."

"I hate that you're here."

"I love you."

"I wanted you to leave because I wanted you to still be alive."

Just like that, Debbie turns around, kisses her. Lou's lips are soft and pliant and soon enough she's kissing Debbie back, hands cradling Debbie's face. They kiss and kiss and kiss and Debbie wants to sing, wants to cry, wants to be alive. Is almost alive. Could possibly open her eyes and find out that she is, in fact, alive. "You never told me back then what I should've done when you died," Debbie murmurs when Lou finally lets her, lips pressed to Debbie's jaw.

"Doesn't matter anymore."

"Please?"

Lou kisses her again. "This. Just this."

_This,_ Debbie thinks, _this_.

But abruptly, all too soon, Lou stops and jumps away from Debbie. Debbie's too disoriented to notice the strange sound that has caused that right away, but she processes it soon enough, a tap-tap-tap that appears to be coming from somewhere indistinguishable and distinguished all at once.

So, Death does knock.

Lou's staring behind Debbie, at the sink, eyes wide. Debbie turns around to follow her gaze. In three simple steps, she reaches three conclusions:

1\. She has just received her first message.

2\. The shadows that contain a message does now need to exist pre-message.

3\. Claude Becker is about to die. 

**Author's Note:**

> find me on [tumblr!](https://straperine.tumblr.com/)


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